Greedy: Notes from a Bisexual Who Wants Too Much

by Jen Winston

Coming out as bi was intimidating, but coming out as lonely? Terrifying.

men are the romantic equivalent of shishito peppers—one out of every twelve will fuck you up.

But in your heart, you can’t deny that bisexuality has never felt queer enough. It’s never felt queer enough to talk about. It’s never felt queer enough to take up space. It’s never felt queer enough to lead you to community, or to show you who you are.

While normalization has many upsides, it can also have a silencing effect, perpetuating the assumption that being bi is “not a big deal.” Bisexuality tends to feel ubiquitous and thus irrelevant, as if the subject isn’t worth our time.

I promise—however much anyone wants me to stop talking about bisexuality, I want to stop talking about it more.

The reason people think bi women are “just experimenting” and bi men are “actually gay” is because patriarchy has manipulated us into thinking that everyone must be attracted to men.

If we’re saying, ‘No, we’re not confused; no, we’re not promiscuous; no, we’re not greedy,’ then we accept that it’s wrong to be confused, it’s wrong to be greedy, it’s wrong to be promiscuous. And I want to ask, why do we have to work by their rules? The problem isn’t promiscuity—it’s patriarchy, which vilifies sex and dismisses non-monogamy. The problem isn’t confusion—it’s binaries, which encourage us to make finite decisions (usually between two constructs that we never got to choose in the first place). The problem isn’t being greedy—it’s that systems function better when we don’t demand what we deserve.

Cuffed jeans are bi culture.

To this day, it can be hard to tell where I end and the male gaze begins.

insouciance

Consider this your reminder: Memoir consists of recounted experiences, but by its nature, memory is unreliable. That means maybe—in someone else’s story—you actually know what you’re doing.)

We became nightlife snobs (far and away the worst kind of snob—self-righteousness and ketamine make for a lethal combination),

why look up to someone for being themselves when being themselves shouldn’t have been a challenge to begin with?

in terms of worship, safety, and refuge, gay dance floors had given me more than any cathedral ever could.

Getting blocked is like falling in love—you never forget your first time.

I knew sex was the key to power long before I experienced either sex or power, and long before I knew how much people could abuse them both.

the idea that “justice” looked like forcing our abusers to spend the rest of their lives in regret, whether inside a cell or dealing with the repercussions of a criminal record outside of one. Not only was this a lie—out of every 1,000 sexual assaults, only four would be incarcerated—but it made no sense: Just because someone went to jail or had their voting rights witheld didn’t mean they were healed. Prisons conflated accountability with vengeance, but these alternatives promised something more: rehabilitation, redemption, and a future beyond social death.

I felt honored to “show up for equal rights,” though I didn’t realize that an event full of cops and corporations was anything but progressive. I definitely didn’t realize that the pursuit of equality was inherently a flawed mission, since it encouraged us to chase milestones that were only important because straight people had deemed them so.

Years earlier, in 2010, activists and allies had begged to repeal “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” What might have happened if the energy spent fighting for inclusive military policies had instead been used to critique the concept of war itself?

Professor Lisa Duggan popularized the term, writing, “We have been administered a kind of political sedative—we get marriage and the military, then we go home and cook dinner forever.” Her point was that if we only focus on equality, we’ll only end up achieving assimilation.

I would eventually realize that the thing making me so uncomfortable was “femme invisibility,” a tendency for femme-presenting queer people to be overlooked and invalidated, even within queer contexts. I’d learn that even though the issue transpired in spaces where men weren’t usually present, it still stemmed from sexism—butch lesbians were often perceived as more “valid” because of the arbitrary value patriarchy places on masculinity.VIII

“Not gay as in happy—queer as in fuck the police.”

“Let today be the last day that you ever doubt Black trans power,” declared speaker and organizer Raquel Willis, and the crowd erupted, chanting: “Black trans power matters.” Of course Black trans lives matter too, but that day reinforced that asking for the minimum has never been enough.

On paper, we wanted to burn everything down. But in reality? We… still wanted to burn everything down. The difference, though, was that in reality destroying the status quo wouldn’t be an act of anger. It would be an act of compassion. Setting normativity ablaze meant creating space to start anew.

“You say love is the answer. We say abolition is love.”

Tbh seems like ppl are scared of male bisexuality bc it threatens masculinity. Masculinity as a concept is supposed to be all decisive and sure of itself (eye roll). But as you and I both know, bisexuality is associated with confusion, fluidity, multiple options, etc—and all of those are seen as “feminine” (or at least not masc). That means bi men are embracing their “feminine” side in multiple ways. The gender binary is SHAKING. Bi men are the fucking best—y’all have the potential to be traitors to the patriarchy and smash that shit from inside!

Resolutions masquerade as critical plot points but they’re usually preordained throwaways, driveways that we already know we’re going to pull into. It’s why so many rom-coms put the much-anticipated kiss right before the credits: No one wants to see the protagonists cook a healthy dinner and go to bed by nine.

The True Love industrial complex feeds us grandiose dreams to occupy our dainty brains, hopeful that wedding planning will distract from thoughts of uprising and masturbation.

One of True Love’s cruelest jokes is that the entire concept hinges on scarcity.

Sure, a feminist can still “fall in love,” but she should do it only if it’s what she wants. But where’s the line? There’s things we want, and then there’s things the world tells us to want. But how can we determine where one ends and the other begins?

When sexism doesn’t tell you who should cook, who cooks? The better cook. Beautiful.

When I say Queer Love, I mean love that makes its own rules. Love that exists without borders and thrives without clean lines. Love that creates more space than it takes up.X

It may be a queer stereotype to fall in love fast, but maybe that’s not such a bad thing. Maybe it means you’re more in touch with yourself and your feelings. Maybe we’d all fall in love fast if we thought we were allowed.

Andrea Long Chu writes, “If there is any lesson of gender transition—from the simplest request regarding pronouns to the most invasive surgeries—it’s that gender is something other people have to give you. Gender exists, if it is to exist at all, only in the structural generosity of strangers.”

If society teaches men that the worst thing to be is a woman, Heldman probes, is it really a surprise when men treat women like shit?

“Femininity is a social construct that doesn’t belong to women or men, and can be explored by anybody,” Al-Kadhi writes. “If femininity is something artificial, then biological sex shouldn’t have anything to do with performing it.”

Gender feels restrictive. It feels like quarantine. Maybe it’s time to go outside.

“When people, especially white people, consider a world without the police, they envision a society as violent as our current one, merely without law enforcement—and they shudder.”

“Queer people anywhere are responsible for queer people everywhere,” full stop.